Tuesday, May 24, 2016

by Ashley MedinaMonmouth University Polling Institute graduate assistantAs it becomes increasingly
likely that the American public is now looking at their two major party
candidates for the 2016 election, pollsters will begin to test the head to head
matchup between Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump with more frequency. However, what
many of these pollsters may fail to account for are the number of voters who may
be looking for another option come election day.

A recent NBC News/Survey Monkey poll found 16% of voters nationwide
say they would vote for a generic “3rd party” candidate rather than vote for either Clinton or Trump.
These numbers suggest that a substantial number of U.S. voters may be seeking
another option this November. While the U.S. electorate has expressed similar
sentiments in the past, a single third party candidate has received that large
of a vote share only once before.

In 1992, self-funded Reform
Party candidate Ross Perot won nearly 19% of the total 20% of votes earned by
independent and third party candidates. The next largest showing for a single
independent or 3rd party candidate came in the 1968 presidential
election when American Independent Party candidate George Wallace earned nearly
all 14% of the third-party candidate votes that year. Perot ran again in 1996,
but this time, earned just 8% of the 10% total vote that independent and 3rd
party candidates received. The 1996 election marked just the third time since
1948 that third party and independent candidates combined received at least
double digit support.

If current polling remains
consistent, the third party gains in this upcoming presidential election could reach
double digits. However, there are some caveats facing third party candidates during
this cycle. For one, there will likely be several candidates vying for
independent and third party votes. Additionally, many of them are largely
unknown to most Americans and are likely to remain unknown unless they can make
it to the debate stage. In order to do so, these candidates must appear on
enough state ballots to mathematically earn an Electoral College victory as well as average at least 15% in
national polls. Without the opportunity to participate in presidential debates,
they will struggle to increase their name recognition.

However, only three polls to
date have included individual third party candidates. The first of these, a national
Monmouth University Poll taken in March, found that in a match-up between the two
front runners, Hillary Clinton held a ten point lead over Donald Trump. When Libertarian third party candidate Gary Johnson was
added to the mix, both Clinton's and Trump’s numbers fell as Johnson pulled in 11% of the vote. This
pattern was mirrored in a similar national Public Policy Poll where
Clinton held a 6 point lead
over Trump, but Clinton’s lead shrunk to 4 points
when two third party candidates were added to the mock ballot, with Johnson at 4%
and Green Party candidate Jill Stein at 2%. In a more recent national Fox News Poll,
results were consistent with these third party findings. In this poll, when
respondents were asked to choose first between Clinton and Trump, Trump led Clinton by 3 points, but when given the option of choosing between Clinton,
Trump, and Johnson, Trump’s and Clinton’s vote share dropped 3 points each as Gary
Johnson garnered 10% of the vote.

Given high voter discontent,
it is likely that the third party vote will be higher than average this year,
but we will not know just how high unless other polls include third party
candidates in their surveys. As the rules stand, including these third party
candidates in more polls is necessary if they are to have a chance at
participating in the presidential debates.

The national polling requirements
for third party candidates are rather unrealistic given the fact that a third
party candidate was only once able to
cross the 15% margin in the past 70 years. A look at Wallace’s regional appeal
in 1968 suggests that this requirement may be unfair, as Wallace was able to
earn enough Electoral College votes to impact the final outcome. More recently,
in 2000, it is possible Ralph Nader’s 3% share of the vote was a contributing
factor in that year’s race.

With this in mind, it is
clear that even five percentage points in the polls can reflect the mood and
preferences of significant segments of the U.S. voting base and as such, the
voices of third party supporters should be represented on the presidential
debate stage. It is for this reason that more pollsters should use
methodologically sound ways to include these candidates in their polls.

Thursday, May 19, 2016

Recently,
the political divide within the Republican Party became even more evident when Speaker
of the House Paul Ryan issued a statement expressing that he is “not ready” to endorse Republican frontrunner Donald
Trump. However, the Speaker’s unwillingness
to endorse the billionaire may hurt his own political career as opposed to that
of the presidential candidate.

Trump
and some of his supporters have voiced strong positions concerning the issue of
Ryan’s statement but what does the greater electorate think? Results from a recent (5/6-9) YouGov/Economist Poll cite that two out of three
voters who participated (or plan to participate) in the GOP primaries and
caucuses believe that Ryan should endorse Trump.

Personal
differences aside, Ryan now has to measure how the general Republican base’s
attitudes and allegiances will affect his standing. Keeping in mind the tremendous popular
support the billionaire has been able to cultivate, it may be in Ryan’s best interest
to officially support the candidate if he would like to maintain favor among
the Republican electorate.

As
the political climate stands now, Republican voters are actually more likely to
side with Trump who among all American voters, is viewed favorably by only 30% and unfavorably by 64%. By comparison, Ryan is viewed somewhat more
positively, with 34% of US voters viewing him favorably and 38% unfavorably.

Ryan
may be better liked than Trump among all voters, but among Republicans only, two out of three actually have positive views
of Trump. Should Trump mobilize his
supporters against the Speaker, Ryan is likely to face political ramifications
for his recent statements. This, along
with the fact 49% of GOP voters disapprove of what Ryan has done
as Speaker of the House, may motivate him to
“get ready” sooner rather than later to support the presumptive presidential
nominee.

Wednesday, May 11, 2016

What is up with West Virginia Democrats? Eight years ago, Hillary Clinton
won every single county on the way to a 2-to-1 victory over Barack Obama. This year she lost every single county and
got trounced by Bernie Sanders.

Well, here’s the thing. Many of
those voters aren’t really Democrats at all – at least not by any standards we
would call a Democrat in the rest of the country. While Democrats are still competitive for
statewide office there, West Virginia has been solidly red in presidential
elections for more than a decade.

In fact, the exit poll included two questions about the November
election pitting Donald Trump against either Clinton or Sanders. According to results shown on MSNBC’s primary
night coverage, nearly 3-in-10 of these Democratic primary voters actually said
they will vote for Trump in either match-up.

Let that sink in. Three-in-ten voters
who just cast a ballot in the Democratic primary said they would be voting for
Trump in November regardless of “their” party’s nominee. For the record, most of these Trump
supporters voted for Sanders over Clinton – 60% to 12%, with another 28% of
these mischief-makers voting for one of the largely unknown other names on the
ballot.

These Trump supporters who took part in the Democratic primary are more
likely than others to be from coal mining households (53%), more likely to be
very worried about the nation’s economy (81%), and more likely to want the next
president to be less liberal than Obama (69%).
The latter question has been asked in every exit poll this season and
this is the only place where that many voters in a Democratic primary said they
want to move in a less liberal direction!

These voters are most likely “legacy” Democrat. They belong to the party as it exists in West
Virginia, but they disdain the Democratic brand on the national stage. It’s not that they like Bernie Sanders, but it’s
more likely that they really detest Hillary Clinton. If these voters did not participate in the
presidential primary, we would have likely seen an extremely close margin
between Sanders and Clinton rather than Sanders’s 15 point win.

And this may not be the strangest West Virginia outcome in the past few
cycles. Remember that four years ago, a convicted felon who was incarcerated in
Texas at the time got 41% of the Democratic primary vote against Obama.

So, let’s just mark the West Virginia primary down as one strange
footnote to a very strange primary season.

Wednesday, May 4, 2016

The Cruz campaign’s attempt to coalesce the #NeverTrump
movement around their candidate #NeverHappened.
In hindsight, the attempt to position him as the establishment
alternative may not have been the wisest move.

Ted Cruz entered the 2016 presidential race with a reputation
as the Senate Republican conference’s enfant
terrible. He ended his campaign as
the establishment’s last hope to deny Donald Trump the party’s nomination. The problem is that GOP voters’ desire for a political
outsider intensified just as he was making this pivot.

Exit polls conducted by the national media’s National
Election Pool asked voters in 24 different contests this year whether the next president should
have experience in politics or be from outside the political establishment.

In the first four contests held in February, Republican
voters were divided – 49 percent wanted an outsider while 45 percent favored
someone with political experience. The preference
for an insider fell off in early March’s Super Tuesday primaries – with 49
percent still wanting an outsider but only 41 percent looking for political experience.

By the mid-March primaries, a 52 percent majority of GOP voters preferred a
political outsider compared to 41 percent who still wanted an experienced
politician. The gap widened in the April contests,
with nearly 6-in-10 Republicans (59 percent) wanting an outsider and just 37
percent favoring an insider. In
yesterday’s Indiana primary, the results for this question stood at 59 percent outsider
and 35 percent insider.

The Cruz recasting gambit worked to the extent that he was ultimately seen
as the establishment candidate – 68 percent of Indiana Republicans who want an
insider voted for him. In the very first contest of 2016 – the Iowa caucuses – Marco Rubio was actually the preferred candidate of voters wanting someone with political experience, even though Cruz was the overall winner on the night.

However, Donald Trump
has been the favored choice of GOP voters looking for a true outsider since the very beginning of the primary season. He won
46 percent of this group’s vote in Iowa, culminating with a 78
percent showing in Indiana three months later.

“In retrospect, Cruz's pivot to
being the face of the establishment was a mistake. Cruz ceded the
outsider mantle to Trump at the very same time the Republican base's desire
for an outsider grew,” said Patrick Murray, director of the independent
Monmouth University Polling Institute.